“It Floats”

An interesting story is told of how the familiar words “It floats” came to be used as the advertisement for a certain popular soap. Years ago, when the product was ready to be put on the market, the advertising Manager asked for a phrase or sentence that would describe the soap and differentiate it from any other.

One of the clerks in the manager’s office submitted the following: “The alkaline elements and vegetable fats in this product are blended in such a way as to secure the highest quality of saponification alone, with a specific gravity that keeps it on top of the water, relieving the bather of the trouble and annoyance of fishing around for it in the bottom during his ablutions.”

The advertising manager blue-penciled this and substituted the two words, “It floats”.

Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations : A Treasury of Illustrations, Anecdotes, Facts and Quotations for Pastors, Teachers and Christian Workers (Garland TX: Bible Communications, 1996, c1979).